TravTalk India Online Magazine
Federation of Associations in Indian Tourism & Hospitality (FAITH) recently organised an ‘India Tourism Vision Day’ with the theme ‘For Indian tourism to thrive tomorrow, it has to survive and revive today’. The event saw in attendance Presidents of all 10 member associations of FAITH.
Nisha Verma
In his inaugural address, Nakul Anand, Chairman, FAITH, said that there needs to be a COVID-19 fund set up by MOT where interest-free funds are given to support employees and the operating costs of tourism companies. “We believe, like the way GST Council is structured, Indian tourism needs to be structured through a constitutionally empowered legislative body – a national tourism council headed by our PM with the presence of all chief ministers. This will enable fast-track Centre and state-level tourism decision making and work on a ‘One India, One Tourism’ approach,” he explained.
Captain Swadesh Kumar, President, ATOAI, said, “Our vision is to get at a respectable market share of 5-10 per cent in the adventure tourism market. We must have a sustainable and responsible development plan for each vertical of natural heritage tourism. There should be robust hub-and-spoke, all season, inter-modal connectivity across air, rail, road and water.”
Listing his vision, PP Khanna, President, ADTOI, said, “There’s a need to make income tax exemption on travelling within India. Indian citizens can get income tax credits for upto `1.5 lakh when spending with GST-registered domestic tour operators, travel agents, hoteliers and transporters. GST on tour operators should be 1.8 per cent with full set off.”
Hotels and restaurants across India need to be declared as an industry, demanded Gurbaxish Singh Kohli, Vice President, FHRAI. “Tax and GST concessions will make our hotels and restaurants truly cost effective and will stimulate demand. E-single window clearance at a national level must be enabled through Hospitality Development Promotion Board,” he said.
MP Bezbaruah, Secretary General, HAI, said that hotels must be declared as social infrastructure. He added, “Our hospitality PPP models need to be standardised across the country, export of tourism taxes should be stopped and SEIS scrip rate must be enabled at 10 per cent for all future period.”
Amaresh Tiwari, Vice Chairman, ICPB, shared, “We need to create a global M!CE bidding fund with a corpus for `500 crore. There is also a need to incentivise Indian corporates to undertake domestic M!CE and to prevent Indian M!CE events from going abroad. We need to offer a 200 per cent weighted income tax expense benefit to Indian companies undertaking M!CE in COVID India.”
Sharat Chandra, Treasurer, ITTA, said there is a need to standardise all interstate road taxes and make them payable at a single point. He also demanded “complete waiver from payment of interstate taxes on tourist transport vehicles for a period of one year.”
For Gajsingh Jodhpur, President, IHHA, “There is a need to create a heritage restoration fund and set up a corpus of at least `1000 crore. Our depreciation policies, property and other municipal taxes need to be accommodative. Heritage buildings restored into hotels should be made tax-free.”
Pronab Sarkar, President, IATO, shared that SEIS rate should be 10 per cent for the next 10 years, and should be payable immediately on the financial year 2019-20. “Inbound tourism needs to be treated on a par with merchandise exports and needs to be zero-rated on GST,” he said.
For Jyoti Mayal, President, TAAI and VC, FAITH, “TCS makes Indian travel agents uncompetitive by 5-10 per cent via their global counterparts. We hope to see a competitive GST regime for agents being rolled out soon.”
Pradip Lulla, Acting President and VP, TAFI,welcoming the judgement on refunds, said, “We have worked long and hard for it.”
